Our Summer So Far

We have less than a month until Eden starts pre-k!  Ah!  Summer is FLYIN'!

Let's back up though...

First, it was the last day of school.

Eden LOVED school.  She cried and cried and cried because the year came to an end, and she cried and cried and cried some more when she found out that when she goes back in August, she won't be in her precious Mrs. Machala's class anymore, she has to move up.  When Mrs. Machala brought Eden out to me on that last day of school, Eden just sobbed.  Mrs. Machala picked her up and hugged her, and Eden just cried and cried into her.  It was sad and sweet, and I just felt so blessed that such a wonderful woman came into Eden's life.  I was completely blown away at just how awesome Eden's preschool is; she grew and matured and learned so much!

Then we had an end-of-the-year program.

Adorable.

Ila was the cutest too.  When we walked into the gym where the program was held, Dustin was holding Ila, and I went and dropped Eden off with her class.  When I came back without Eden, Ila was VERY concerned.  "Uh-oh!  Gone gone!  Sissy!  Gone Gone."  Her little face had this little worried look on it.  We found our seats, and some friends sat down next to us, and Ila immediately told them, "Gone gone!  Gone gone!  Gone gone!  Uh-oh!"  She just sat there all worried until it was time for Eden's class to get up on stage, and then when we pointed Eden out to Ila, she just broke out in the biggest grin.

watching her Sissy up on stage

A few more pictures from the evening:

The very first thing we did once Eden was done with her school year was head to The Children's Museum.  Eden got out of school about a week before all the Houston districts did, so we took advantage of that and went to the museum before it got crazy crowded for summer.  After going there one June a few years ago, I vowed I would never return there during the summer again, and I have not changed my mind!

All it did in May was rain.  Every single day.  Like flooded.  Shut down our roads.  But we made the most of it.

In June though, we got our usual Texas weather back... and now it's HOT, HOT, HOT!  You know, I've lived in Texas all my thirty years, and it is STILL shocking to me each summer just how hot it can be.

We have us a nice little routine going this summer.  Cause I'm all about routines.  Eden still takes horseback riding lessons, and we go every other Monday.  Ila gets to ride a little bit at each lesson now too, and at the end of the lesson, Mr. Raley lets us walk through his stable so the girls can see all of his horses and feed them carrots (and the occasional peppermint).

Mr. Raley is another person I feel so blessed to have in my childrens' lives.

On Tuesdays, Eden has gymnastics.

On Wednesdays, we're back to doing what we did almost every single Wednesday before Eden started preschool last fall.  We go for donuts, then story time at the library (where I just chase Ila around the entire time and try to get her to be quiet!), and then we go play at the park.

On Thursdays, a lady comes to our house to give Eden swimming lessons (our new house has a pool, y'all!).  Eden already kinndddaaaa knew how to swim from last summer, but I wanted her in lessons so she could become a stronger swimmer (having a pool is awesome, and it also scares the crap out of me!).  Well Eden is apparently part fish and caught on SO QUICKLY that I'm actually a little bit upset about it because I feel like I wasted my money!  She swims all over, floats on her back, dives to the bottom to get rings, etc.

Then we have Fridays and the weekends to relaxxxx and be lazy and watch movies and bake cookies and go swimming and take the occasional walk.  Life is good.

So having a swimming pool is AWESOME!  Now that we have it, I'm not sure how we ever survived without it?  Like, what did we even do last summer?  We are in the pool every day.  EVERY DAY.  Wake up in the morning, Eden wants to go straight to the pool.  Come home from gymnastics, Eden wants to go straight to the pool.  Go to the grocery store, Eden wants to know how much longer until we're home so she can get in the pool.  You know what's great about a pool?  Kids never get tired of it!  Eden and Ila can swim all day, every day.  Then they go to sleep early because they're exhausted from swimming, and then Dustin and I get in, float around, drink beer.  A swimming pool... It's just about the best invention ever!

 the dogs love the pool too!

Besides all that, we've gone to Splashway twice so far, and I'm hoping to get one more trip in before school starts!

We've fished.

We celebrated Father's Day.

And the 4th of July.

We entered Eden in the Little Wrangler Rodeo (TEXAS, Y'ALL!), and she won 3rd place in hay hauling out of 14 kids AND she was brave enough to try mutton bustin'!  (And if you don't know what mutton bustin' is, you must google it immediately!)

I took Eden to see her first 3D movie.

My mom came and stayed with the girls while Dustin and I went to Matagorda with my cousin and his wife for a day of offshore fishing.  I caught the biggest fish!

Annndddd, I turned THIRTY!  And y'all, thanks to my mom, I finally got a Barbie birthday cake!

It's been a heck of a good summer so far, and we're gonna keep going strong!

a Sunday picture

Ila - 20 Months!

Our girl is 20 months old.

She's feisty and demanding, throwing a fit when things don't go her way and yelling AT US when she doesn't get what she wants.

She's loving and cuddly, throwing her little arms around us to hug us and using her little hands to turn my head toward her to insist that I kiss her over and over.

She's brave and adventurous, jumping off the diving rock into the pool and sliding down the biggest slide at the playground.

Her favorite thing to do is... wait for it... BRUSH HER TEETH!  Oh my goodness does she get excited when it's time to brush her teeth!

She has started sitting still for an ENTIRE book (prior to just a few weeks ago, the longest she could sit still for was about two pages), and now she wants to have books read to her constantly!  (Only if there are flaps for her to lift or touchy-feely things on the pages for her to play with... otherwise, she's not interested!)  When it's nap or bedtime, she wants to be laid down with a book in her hands, and then she'll just lay there and flip through it until she falls asleep.

She has a head full of the silkiest, softest, prettiest curls.

She likes clothes and shoes and is constantly trying to put on her big sister's shorts and shirts (because sometimes big sister forgets to put her clothes in the hamper and leaves them on the floor).  She's pretty good at putting on shorts actually, and it's hilarious when she emerges from the back bedrooms with a pair of Eden's shorts over her clothes.  She is also already pretty adamant about what she's wearing and there have been a few times that I've tried to put an outfit or a certain pair of shoes on her, and I'm met with a firm "no" and a shake of her head.  It's new territory for me as Eden still does not care what I dress her in!

She understands pretty much everything we say, can follow directions (although she doesn't always CHOOSE to), and says lots and lots and lots of words.  My recent favorite was last week when we were all swimming... Dustin, Eden and I were playing Marco Polo while Ila was floating around the pool.  I guess Ila decided she wanted to join in after watching us and hearing us yell "MARCO! POLO!".  All of a sudden she started screaming, "MARRRR-MO, MARRRR-MO, MARRRR-MO"!

She's growing up too fast.  That's for sure.

So I'm just over here, trying my hardest to soak it all up and enjoy these last few baby months!

Hold Me Close, Young Tony Danza

Eden had her first dance recital yesterday.  IT WAS PRECIOUS!  Completely adorable!  Quite possibly the cutest thing I've ever seen!

It was not my idea to sign Eden up for ballet last fall; she is the one who came to me asking for "ballerina lessons".  And prior to yesterday, I really wasn't all that into it.  I thought she was cute in her little leotard and tutu at each class, of course, but I was never in dance as a kid and didn't know the first thing about ballet or the dance world.  After the excitement of the recital though, I'm hooked!  I signed up to be the class mom, so I was backstage in a room with all the preschool-aged dancers, and it was so cute and fun, and I'm like, a total dance mom now!  The day was such a high!

Eden was so sweet and so adorable and so CONFIDENT out there on that stage, and I cried during her whole dance!  And even once we got back to the room with all the other little dancers, I COULD NOT STOP CRYING, and I texted Dustin all, "I CAN'T STOP!"  But I was just SO PROUD of her!  

She was on cloud nine, telling me how "everyone who loves me came to see me".  She got flowers from all her grandparents, and she was soooo excited about the little trophy all the dancers got.  She yelled out "MOMMY!" and held up her trophy for me to see from the stage!  (And when we got home last night, she was so nice and wanted all of us to be able to share her flowers with her, so she put one of her bouquets in Ila's room and one by Dustin's side of the bed and one by my side of the bed.)

on stage for the final bow and the awards ceremony

When we got home last night, I asked her if she wanted to do ballet again next year.  She said yes. YAYYYYYY, can't wait!

Ila - 19 months! (yeah, I missed a few!)

 Ila at 16 months

Ila at 17 months

Ila at 19 months

(My 18 month photos of Ila got accidentally deleted off of my camera!!!!  WAHHHHH!!!!!!)

Ok.  So.  You may notice that the background in Ila's 19 month photo is different!  That's because WE MOVED!  More on that later.  But us moving is one of the reasons why it has been MONTHS since I've gotten to sit down and write a blog post.  

The OTHER reason is this:

Don't let that sweet face fool you!  Ila has quite of few nicknames in our house... some of them include "Tiny Terror", "Little Monster" and "Bad Baby".

Always said with love, of course!  

But MAN!  This girl is something else!

For starters, she is constantly on the move.  There is not a moment's rest with her around.  You cannot take your eyes off of her for a second!  A few weeks ago, before she was big enough to climb onto the couch, Dustin called me into the other room to ask me a question.  Ila was preoccupied with a toy so I thought it was safe.  I walked back into the room less than five minutes later, and she had dragged a step-stool (I had been arranging things on shelves) all the way across the room to the BACK of the couch, climbed up it, and flung herself over the back of the couch to get on it.  These days, she can get on the couch without the use of a step-stool, which is pretty annoying because her favorite thing to do is THROW HERSELF OFF THE COUCH ONTO THE GROUND, then grin up at me from her sprawled out position on the floor and say, "BOOM BOOM!  AGAIN?  AGAIN?  AGAIN?"

NO!!!  NOT AGAIN!!!  STOP IT, STOP IT, STOP IT, STOPPPPPPP!!!!!!

"Why is she trying to kill herself?", I asked Dustin recently.

I mean...

She can't just take a simple picture; she has to be all wild and crazy and try and hurt herself!

When she's not throwing herself off of furniture, she's either emptying a drawer or a cabinet of its contents OR she's standing at the refrigerator crying because she's STARVING even though she ate two bananas and a yogurt five minutes ago.  Girl still likes to eat.  Still crazy.  Because girl is also still really tiny.

Usually I can only take showers when Ila is sleeping, but last week I desperately needed to take a shower before going somewhere.  So I brought Ila into the bathroom with me, shut the door and gave her a basket of toys.  Lots of toys.  She had lots of choices.  I get into the shower.  When I get out of the shower, Ila has found a tub of vaseline in my cabinet.  There is vaseline EVERYWHERE.  Floor, walls, cabinets, new rugs... and coated all over her hair.  I mean, ALL OVER her hair.  I washed her hair four times that day, and it was still so greasy that it looked soaking wet even though it was dry.  It's been 8 days since that incident, and her hair is FINALLY back to normal!

So one time when Eden was 9 months old, she was playing with an empty water bottle while a friend and I sat talking.  When we were done talking and it was time for us to leave, I took the empty water bottle away from Eden and threw it in the trashcan.  Eden had no reaction to me doing this at all.  And I remember my friend being shocked and all, "She doesn't care when you take something away from her?'  And I was like, "Um, no?"  And my friend said, "Wow!  My son would have freaked if I would have just taken something away from him like that!"  And at the time, I remember thinking how strange that was.   Because I was so used to easy-going Eden who was such a go-with-the-flow baby, and I was thought to myself, "What kind of a child would freak out about something like that?"  

Oh!  Pick me, pick me!  

ILA WOULD!

Yeah, so Ila is totally the kind of baby that freaks out if you try to take ANYTHING away from her EVER!  People ask me if I have a hard time getting Eden to share with her little sister.  Um, no.  Ila, however, is completely incapable of sharing.  Ila is my particular child.  Ila is my feisty child.  Just this past Sunday, Ila had a COMPLETE MELTDOWN in church DURING THE SERMON because I gave Eden the green cup of cheerios and her the pink cup of cheerios, and she HAD to have the green cup OR ELSE OR ELSE OR ELSE!  I hate giving into her, but when it's Sunday sermon time... I yanked that green cup out of Eden's hands so fast to give to Ila.  Eden, of course, couldn't have cared less.

Also, she likes to growl at us.  Well at me.  If I tell her the word "no", she growls at me.  Sounds just like a dog or something.  Now, if Dustin tells her "no", she completely loses it and comes running to me to console her.  She does NOT like it when her daddy scolds her!

My brother has already told me that I gave Ila the wrong room in our new house.  "This room is easier to sneak out of.  You should have given it to Eden because you know if one of them is going to try and sneak out as a teenager, it's gonna be Ila."

To sum... Ila can be a little... shall we say "difficult"?  BUT!  We wouldn't want her any other way.  She makes life so enjoyable.  She's so funny.  And she KNOWS she's cute and funny and she's constantly hamming it up for us.  She makes us laugh.  She gives THE BEST hugs.  She wraps those little arms around your neck so tight.  She always says "BLESS YOU!" anytime somebody sneezes which I think it the cutest thing ever.  She's brave and adventurous.  She's sweet and cuddly.

She's so happy.  You know, unless she's mad.  Which happens very quickly.  But I'm still gonna go with happy for most of the time.  

She loves the dogs.  When I open the door to go outside, she'll come running and stand in the doorway screaming, "DOGS!  DOGS!  DOGGGGSSSSS!!!" until they come running.

That's her dog, Blue, on the right.  He's a big boy!

She loves books and is constantly getting them off the bookshelf and bringing them to me.  She plops down on my lap and gets sooooo excited that she starts giggling when we start a book.  Then after about one page, she tosses it aside and runs to get a different book and brings that one to me.  And so on and so on.  I'm actually not sure if I've ever made it through an entire book in one sitting with her.

She loves bath time.

She loves shoes.

She loves Elmo.

She loves to run in circles, stomp her feet, and throw herself to the ground.

She loves babydolls.

She loves to swing.

She's my super spirited little girl, and we couldn't imagine life without her!